by S A Shaffer
Francisco then walked to the far side of the tower and pulled a torch from his pocket as his men bound and gagged the unconscious guards. He pointed it out the window toward the far end of the facility and switched it on and off three times. He waited for three agonizing minutes before a torch flashed back three times. Francisco breathed a sigh of relief and walked to the other end of the tower and flashed his torch down at the main gate they had entered. A light flashed back, and within moments, men started pouring in through the gate, hundreds at a time. Several pulled canvas-covered pallets suspended beneath balloons. Francisco watched for a moment as the men continued to flood the facility, then he turned back to his men and the four bound guards.
With a nod, he turned and entered the steam lift once again, but this time keying the lowest floor. The shaft dropped, and he felt a tickle in his stomach as they dropped lower and lower below the ground level. As they rode along Francisco ran through the list of responsibilities on the mission. The hard part was over. Now they had but to deal with two nightshift engineers, shut off the facilities power, and spirit away to safety while Admiral York did the hard part. The doors opened and the four sneaks stepped out into a very different environment.
A dull glow illuminated a narrow hall that led a few strides in one direction toward a brighter lit room. Several dozen thick conduits ran along the hallway, and the sound of rhythmic hissing and pumping echoed. Francisco and his men ran along the hall until they reached the room at the end. The sound of machinery increased in volume as they entered; however, there Francisco and his men froze in place. Three guards and twice as many engineers turned and looked at them in unison. They sat around a pile of game pieces on top of a makeshift table. The room thrummed for a few seconds as two groups of men looked at each other and the Veteran Shipyard’s generator carried on its endless work. Francisco thought fast.
“What is going on here!” he barked in his best sergeant’s voice.
The guardsmen stood at attention, but the engineers folded their arms and scowled, all except one who took advantage of the situation and peeked under the guard’s cards while they were faced away.
“I asked, what is going on here.” Francisco said again. He positioned himself beside his sneaks so as not to get caught in the crossfire when the shooting started.
“Just a bit of gaming, sergeant.” The shortest guardsman said.
Francisco nodded and noticed the guards’ repeaters resting to one side of the table within reach of the engineers and that the guards still had their pistols holstered at their sides. There was no way they could taze all nine men before they started shooting back. Unless…
“Whose idea was this?” Francisco asked. “One of you greasy faced engineers?”
The engineers’ frowns deepened.
“Answer me!” Francisco said.
One of the engineers rose to his feet with confident defiance before saying, “That’s chief engineer to you, sergeant. I don’t have to take any of your cheek.”
Francisco smiled and then he looked at the three guardsmen and pointed to one side of the room. “Line up.” He said.
The guards hopped to and lined up exactly on the spot he pointed. Francisco stepped up to the gaming table and kicked it as hard as he could, sending its crate top flipping end over end on top of the repeaters. In the same instant he raised his hand and tazed the nearest engineer. The chief had already raised his fists for a fight when Francisco heard the other sneaks’ pulse emitters buzzing away. One of the engineers dove at Francisco, but he easily sidestepped the man and tazed him, sending him to the cement floor with a thud. Just in that moment, when Francisco’s focus was otherwise engaged, the chief engineer reached under the broken table at his feet and pulled out a repeater. Francisco whirled to face him at the clinking sound of a round sliding into the chamber, and for a brief moment stared into the triumphant eyes of the chief engineer who held the repeater to his head. But before the man could fire, a glowing blue pulse struck his chest, and he crumpled to the floor with a blank, drooling expression. Francisco turned around and saw Shultz with his pulse emitter still extended.
“Much obliged, Shultz.” Francisco said, and then pointed to the other two sneaks. “Tie up these clowns. Shultz, shut down the power to the armaments. We’re behind schedule now, so double time.”
In five minutes’ time, the guards and engineers were tied and gagged, but Shultz still busied himself in a mess of wires at one side of a power grid.
“Shultz?” Francisco said as he checked his watch. “We’re out of time.”
“I just need a couple more minutes, sir.” Shultz said as he held a screwdriver in his mouth. He clipped some wires with his pliers and twisted two, exposed copper ends together. “If I turn all the power off, we won’t be able to use the steam lift to get out.
“You have one minute, then we’ll take our chances.” Francisco said. He replaced his pocket watch and checked the charge on his pulse emitter. Two minutes later, the group of them piled into the steam lift and rose back to the ground level. When the doors opened, they reemerged into the light rain, and the cool air was a pleasant change from a stuffy engineering room. During their time below ground, Admiral York had been busy. Already, the running lights of 500 odd airships glowed as they awoke from their sleepy berths. Men scurried around below the stacks of ships loading munitions and armaments. In the dim light of the facility Francisco could see aeronauts scurrying around on carrier decks as they bolted down gunship-grade pulse emitters.
“Sir,” a man said as he ran up to Francisco. He was one of the other team leaders responsible for clearing the walls of guards.
“Ah, Eric.” Francisco said. “Nice work on clearing the far wall. That was a whole minute faster than we expected. Where do we stand now?”
Eric smiled before replying with a deep voice that did not match his small stature. “We had one incident where a guard drew his gas pistol and got off a few shots. Most of them missed, but two of our men have minor injuries. The carriers are all powered up and should have minimum lift in another few minutes. Admiral York is just finishing his rearguard’s refit. Barring any unforeseen events, we should be ready for extraction within the hour.”
Francisco checked his watch again. “Excellent. It looks like everyone is ahead of schedule except us. Perhaps I’ll make the run tomorrow with my underpants on my head.”
Eric smiled at that.
“Have the men ready for the extraction but maintain guard over the perimeter. I want the team leaders ready to check in with their torches once we lift off. We’re not leaving a man behind.”
“Aye, sir.” Eric said. He saluted and marched off.
Francisco led his team across the compound at a quick march, and they splashed along the puddles until they passed beneath a massive carrier. He could just see the seams to the large bay doors that concealed the seventy skiffs inside. They joined some other engineers and aeronauts in a steam lift and rose up to the carrier’s main level where gold letters marked the airship as The Barlet. It was a second-generation thunder class carrier named after house Barlet, the house in which Admiral York was born. Francisco crossed some scaffolding and boarded. The ship had a slightly beveled top deck that concealed the large cylindrical internal balloon. Francisco crossed to the front of the ship and stepped inside the armored bridge.
“Admiral, our sneak teams have completed their portion of the mission.” Francisco said. “We await your orders.”
Admiral York looked up from a map and nodded. “Fine work, Francisco. Our crews are nearly complete with the refit. The pulse emitters draw more power than our usual explosive armaments, so we had to run several tests. It would be a shame to launch ourselves into the sky only to burn out and drift uselessly across Alönia.” York smiled as he rubbed his hand along the ship’s wheel with obvious admiration.
“That would be anticlimactic.” Francisco said without any humor at all. “I have ordered my teams to divide up between your rear guard when the time
comes. If any gunships manage to drop borders unto our deck, we will do our best to repel them.”
Admiral York nodded his approval, and Francisco exited the bridge to wait with the rest of his men on the top deck.
Within the hour, York sounded the all clear, the rest of the sneak teams boarded, and the thunder class carriers began to rise above their berths one hundred at a time and soar out of the shipyard. Francisco tapped his fingers against the railing in frustration. The process of mobilizing five hundred ships took far longer than he preferred. The carriers with skeleton crews departed first, most of which had never before flown a carrier, or even an airship. The underground had scoured the houselands looking for Armada Vets and former crewmen from the doomed carriers, but in the end there hadn’t been enough time, and they’d settled for cooks, cleaners, physicians, and pharmacists. York had issued crash courses in airmanship using make-belief controls and photographs. The hope was that when the capital guard realized what was happening, the crews would have a head start, and the rear guard would cover their retreat.
The communication’s relay they’d installed at the tower had been a last-minute idea from Bethany, and just might give them the extra time they needed. If guardsmen saw the carriers departing Veteran Shipyards, and they contacted the tower to see what the issue was, the relay referred them to the underground’s switchboard, and the underground would allay suspicion… in theory. They’d distributed scripted answers, like: we’re reorganizing the airships to make more room; we received an anonymous tip that airmen were going to storm the shipyards, so Blythe has ordered the airships moved. But it was only a matter of time before some blockhead said, you’re seeing things mate, or its none of your bloody business.
Francisco blanched as he considered the possibility. But at the very least, the relay would give them another few precious minutes to make good their escape. If all went according to plan, and they were very, very lucky, they might even reach Armstad airspace before the guard could mobilize.
At long last, Francisco felt a jolt as The Barlet began to rise. The skeleton crews were on their way, and now it was the rear guard’s turn. He watched the top of Shipyard walls come into view and something else that made the grizzled sneak laugh. A flagpole stood on the top of the wall flying several pairs of underpants in place of a flag. Francisco turned to the rest of his team.
“We had to leave our mark, sir.” Shultz said.
Francisco shook his head. “I don’t think they’ll forget us.”
The Barlet rose above the shipyards with its nine other sister ships. The rear guard maneuvered with expert precision and departed in half the time it took any other ten carriers. As soon as they were clear, they switched off their running lights and disappeared into the blanket of cloud. In minutes, they were two grandfathoms out into the channel and a grandfathom in elevation escaping into the night sky.
The men snickered and joked quietly as they went about their business checking and rechecking munitions. There were a dozen watchmen scanning the black expanse with specialized telescopes. Francisco stood at the rear of the ship, examining the clouds below and counting off the minutes. Cool high-elevation air blew around him and filled his lungs. It felt good after the exertion of their mission, cooling his sweaty back and soothing his tired limbs. But he did not allow his senses to dull. His bionic eye swiveled as he scanned the clouds, which is why he saw it first. It started as a glow beneath the cloudbank.
“Ship.” Francisco said, with a sigh. “Ship!” He said again, louder this time. “Below us and to the southwest!”
All conversation ceased as every man looked off the side of the carrier and waited for the lookout to announce the ship type. Francisco didn’t wait, he already knew. He manned a pulse emitter and swiveled it towards the approaching ship. The enlarged version of his wrist emitter had a chair and firing controls mounted beside a row of several flat disks skewered by a central shaft. The hastily built contraption contained parts from obscure places: a dining room chair, hydraulics from a lift, controls from an old skiff, and electronics from a generator. Wires protruded along multiple points in a haphazard fashion along with several notes that read, “Touch and die” or “press for immediate sterilization.” Static filled Francisco’s hair, and he wondered if, perhaps, they should have used more than a piece of wood to separate the gunners from quite a lot of electricity. He ignored his misgivings and lined the prongs of a fork mounted on the end of a metal skewer with the nearest clump of gunships. The chances were slim that any ship other than a capital guard gunship would be crossing the channel at this late hour and at this elevation. On the other hand, it was also far too soon for any pursuit, and this fact troubled Francisco.
“Osprey class gunship,” One of the lookouts called, and the other crewmen groaned. Only the guard used the Osprey class gunship.
Then another lookout called out. “Ship, three ships, five, at least a squad.”
Francisco saw it too. Dozens of gunships rose out of the cloudbank and in moments, the dozens turned into hundreds. The lookouts stopped calling out the ships as they stared through their telescopes with open-mouthed astonishment.
“How did they mobilize so fast?” One of the crewmen said in a mainland accent. “This was supposed to take them half an hour. Even then, I never expected them to gather that many ships.”
“They expected a rescue attempt.” Francisco said as he closed his natural eye and stared between the fork prongs with his bionic eye, waiting for the gunships to fly into range. Francisco thought Blythe foolish, but he never presumed him an idiot. He’d obviously anticipated and prepared for just such a heist.
In the light of the partial moon, Francisco could see each of the approaching gunships silhouetted against the clouds. On the other hand, the moon also gave the gunships a partial view of the carriers as they cut across the sky. Within moments, the entire mass of gunships veered upward in pursuit of the carriers coming ever nearer. He rested his finger on the trigger as he gaged the distance. He noticed that all the other armaments were also swiveling into position preparing to ward off a massive boarding action from hundreds of angry gunships. However, he and the crews waited, each knowing their orders to fire only at point blank range.
Ten seconds. Francisco thought, and he began a mental countdown. But, before he’d reached five, he saw something impossible, something none of them had accounted for. The gunships nearest, the one he had his emitter trained on, flashed for a split second and something small and oblong rocketed away, racing toward the Barlet with impossible speed.
Then a lookout bellowed at the top of his lungs, “Torpedoes!”
THE VOICE OF THE PEOPLE
David watched Mercy leave the glass platform and ascend the stairs in all her grace and beauty after she’d finished her testimony. He wished he could stay near her the entire time she walked the orbital to keep her safe. Now that Blythe knew she was alive and that she was the true spy who’d infiltrated his ranks, he would stop at nothing to kill her. But Mercy had her part to play, just as David did.
David looked back at the assembly and smiled. “I know I am not as pretty as Ms. Lorraine, but I would ask that this assembly hear me out.” Some of the men in the audience nodded their heads. “But I am getting ahead of myself and have skipped my introduction. You know me as David Ike.”
Many of the representatives and aides smiled at that. There were probably a dozen David Ikes in the room that very moment.
“However, my full name is David Ike III.” He saw some of the mocking smiles falter. “My father was Captain David Ike II, a highly decorated officer in the Houseland Armada. However, it is my grandfather with whom this assembly is most familiar, as he was Admiral David Ike, legend in the armada and Hero of the Protectorate War.” David turned and faced Blythe as he finished.
To the casual observer, Blythe’s face looked impassive, but David knew the man well, and he knew the look of veiled shock when he saw it. The rest of the assembly was not so restrained. Wom
en gasped, and men snorted.
“He’s got to be joking.” One man said, and a general murmur followed.
“You’re lying,” Blythe said. “You’re as much a part of the Ike legend as the other Ikes in this room.”
David stepped up to the steam projector and keyed in a code. In a moment, the projector flashed an image of himself, his father and grandfather all smiling after David’s first academy skiff race. While the people gawked with open-mouthed astonishment, David smiled with fond memory at the image. A tear rolled down his cheek.
“Regrettably, my family members are all dead,” David said, “and I am the last surviving member of the Ike legend. A terrible airship accident maimed me, killed my father and eventually my grandfather and mother as well. I tell you this because I wish you to know whom it is that Speaker Blythe accuses of horrible atrocities, and who it is that accuses Speaker Blythe of the same horrible atrocities. I am not some run-about from the streets. My parents raised me under the principles of our family. They raised me to pursue my duty through kindness, justice, and humility. That is the duty of all men, and it is that duty that drives me to make these accusations at great personal risk.”
Blythe, for once, sat speechless, gazing at the image of David and his family projected on the steam cloud above his head. David pressed a few keys and the image vanished. Blythe returned his gaze to David with a mixed expression of anger, fear, and a hint of curiosity.
“Speaker Blythe,” David asked as he began the inquiry in earnest, sensing that he had grasped everyone’s attention. “How did you know Ms. Paula?”
